Clearly some powerpack hardware failed in a non-repairable way (hence the 'lost' and reassurrance of being 'hardware rich'). The reference to being back into testing soon is encouraging - hopefully it means Blue don't believe there's a difficult/complex investigation to be done before testing can resume (although 'soon' could still mean months I guess).
Quote Blue Origin @blueorigin 3m3 minutes agoWe lost a set of powerpack test hardware on one of our BE-4 test stands yesterday. Not unusual during development.https://twitter.com/blueorigin/status/863881495169048576
Blue Origin @blueorigin 3m3 minutes agoWe lost a set of powerpack test hardware on one of our BE-4 test stands yesterday. Not unusual during development.
During development and operation of the Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME), 27 ground test failures of sufficient severity to be termed 'major incident' have occurred.
Has an engine *ever* been developed without destroying itself several times on the test stand? "Normal" or "Expected" might be more honest than "Not unusual".
Has an engine *ever* been developed without destroying itself several times on the test stand?..
During Tom Mueller's recent interview he mentioned blowing up a lot of Merlin 1D engines during development
AIUI, may be the RS-68 didn't had this sort of failures?
I can't think of any high performance and successful engine that didn't had a few martyrs in the name of performance.
The big question is if this failure was due to envelop exploration or normal condition.
And the test stand status, too.
But I'm assuming they had a couple of cells and this was not an RD-170 moment.
Quote from: LouScheffer on 05/15/2017 02:22 pmHas an engine *ever* been developed without destroying itself several times on the test stand? "Normal" or "Expected" might be more honest than "Not unusual".Probably not. During Tom Mueller's recent interview he mentioned blowing up a lot of Merlin 1D engines during development, and that is a "simple" gas generator cycle. - Ed Kyle
1D
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Air Force said Monday it is working to "figure out how to progress forward" after a setback in the development of a U.S.-made rocket engine.Blue Origin, Amazon (AMZN) founder Jeff Bezos' space company, tweeted May 14 that it lost a "set of powerpack test hardware on one of its BE-4" engine tests. The powerpack pumps the propellant, liquid oxygen and methane, through the engine. The company said it would resume testing "soon."Lt. Gen. Arnold Bunch, military deputy in Air Force acquisition, pointed out that the Air Force has agreements with both Blue Origin and Aerojet Rocketdyne (AJRD) to build a replacement for the Russian-made RD-180 engine."We are working with Space and Missile Center to figure out how to progress forward," Bunch told reporters at an Air Force Association breakfast Monday. "We are aware of the Blue Origin setback and we are in dialogue on how to more forward. It is one we are watching because we know the commitment we made to get off of the 180 as quickly as possible."
Correct. Revisiting to assure funding for a "back up".Looks like Raptor's initial firing was less challenging than BE-4's is turning out to be. I had wondered about FFSC possibly being easier than ORSC, even though its more parts.ORSC historically has not been easy at scale for new engines, taking years to accomplish. You're dealing with partially combusted, highly reactive, high pressure/volume products, barely containable by the engine's materials.
According to this years talks and slides they have tested the BE-4 powerpack to 400klbf. 60+ starts at that level.No 550klbf level tests, that was part of this campaign.
Quote from: Space Ghost 1962 on 06/10/2017 02:37 amCorrect. Revisiting to assure funding for a "back up".Looks like Raptor's initial firing was less challenging than BE-4's is turning out to be. I had wondered about FFSC possibly being easier than ORSC, even though its more parts.ORSC historically has not been easy at scale for new engines, taking years to accomplish. You're dealing with partially combusted, highly reactive, high pressure/volume products, barely containable by the engine's materials.Quote from: Chasm on 05/15/2017 04:53 amAccording to this years talks and slides they have tested the BE-4 powerpack to 400klbf. 60+ starts at that level.No 550klbf level tests, that was part of this campaign.A couple of questions, if I may, given that I think (?) Raptor tests are also still at subscale? 1) how much difference is there between isolated powerpack testing (at 400 klbf), and a failure of a powerpack during all-up testing at whatever power level they would use during their initial integration testing?
2) I always think of a FFSC engine as being half ORSC, and half FRSC, and therefore think of FFSC as harder than ORSC. Oversimplify, I'm sure.
Of course, given that BE-4 and Raptor are very similar in thrust, the ORSC engine needs to produce more power in its OR leg (the only preburner leg).
Does this mean that FFSC allows lower temperatures and a lot less reactivity *everywhere* in that leg, or perhaps just in all the difficult bits?
Or, maybe avoiding sealing issues separating OR preburner gasses from the fuel leg?
In general, what are the issues that might make the OR leg of FFSC (Raptor) easier than an ORSC engine (BE-4)?
After 18 charmed months, Blue Origin suffers a setback
Likewise, Hyten (Gen. John Hyten, the head of U.S. Strategic Command) said he wasn’t pleased with media coverage of Blue Origin’s May accident that destroyed a set of powerpack test hardware for the company’s BE-4 engine.“Blue Origin just had a failure. Son of a gun. That’s part of learning,” the general said. “It really upsets me when I see headlines come out in the newspaper after the Blue Origin failure the other day: ‘Blue Origin takes huge step back, big failure!’ I’m going, ‘no, they’re pushing the envelope.’”